


The Adventure of the Thunders of the Upper Deep

by El Staplador (elstaplador)



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Case Fic, F/F, Gen, Handwavium, Sea Monsters, Tentacle Monsters, Trains, Victorian detectives, macho idiocy, mistress/maid relationship, railway geekery, terrible science
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-20
Updated: 2015-04-20
Packaged: 2018-03-24 23:06:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3787726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elstaplador/pseuds/El%20Staplador
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>1892, and the famous consulting detective Madame Vastra is summoned to Devon to investigate a mysterious death. Her faithful companion Jenny Flint accompanies her. Sea air and sea bathing are said to be very good for the nerves. Perhaps that's just as well.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Adventure of the Thunders of the Upper Deep

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sumi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sumi/gifts).



'Did you pack my bathing costume, Jenny?' Madame Vastra asked.

Jenny turned away from the carriage window, where the new town of Swindon pelted through the landscape behind her. 'I did, madam. Do you expect there to be time for bathing?'

'It's possible. It may even be necessary.' Vastra smiled slightly and drew from her reticule the letter that had summoned them west. 'Besides, sea-bathing is renowned for being extremely beneficial to the nerves. Do I mean the nerves?'

'Rather you than me. The sea will be freezing in May.' Jenny returned to her survey of the landscape outside the train. 'Strange to think that this is the last time we'll travel on this train, isn't it, madam?'

'Mm? I don't see that this need be the last time we visit the West Country, even if the dear Bishop is no longer at Truro.'

'This particular train, I mean. They're changing the line over to standard gauge in a couple of days. This engine, these carriages will be scrapped by Monday morning. The railwaymen are quite sad about it all.' Jenny had discussed the question with the porter while she was seeing that their luggage was stowed safely in the guard's van.

'Ah,' Vastra murmured, absorbed in the letter. 'I will never understand humans. So sentimental about what is, after all, only a tool.'

'What does Mr Murray say?'

Vastra coughed. 'I shall read it to you.

' _Dear Madame Vastra,_

' _I take the liberty of writing to you, having been assured of your complete discretion in matters of a delicate nature -_ '

'Did you tell him you don't do divorces?' Jenny interrupted.

'Hush. Listen to this:

' _I entreat your assistance in a most sensitive and urgent matter. I hesitate to supply complete details in writing, being resolved to explain it only in person, where I may impress upon you its serious nature. In short, dear Madame Vastra, I believe that if I were to put down my suspicions in pen and ink you would refuse to come!_ '

'And yet he thinks that we will come if he doesn't tell us!' Jenny sniffed.

' _I should explain that I have responsibility for the works at Dawlish and Starcross this weekend; that is, ensuring that the change from broad-gauge to standard-gauge is not interrupted. My fear is that it will indeed be interrupted, and in the most horrible manner, as it was last week, when our night-watchman disappeared – to reappear two days later, dead!_

' _The police are satisfied that the death was accidental, but I remain convinced that the true explanation is much more sinister. If you can find evidence to the contrary I will be much relieved._

' _In any event, your assistance will be of great value to -_

' _Your humble servant,_

' _J. S. Murray'_

'Dead of what, I wonder?' Jenny said. 'His suspicions must be very outlandish indeed if he won't even put that down on paper.'

'Or,' Vastra mused, 'perhaps so ordinary that he fears we wouldn't come if he did. No matter. We shall find out soon enough. When are we due in, Jenny? Will we have time to meet him before dinner?'

  
Mr Murray was extremely prompt.

'Madame Vastra. Yes. I'm delighted to see you.' He was a tall, thin man with a sharp, precise voice, more like one might imagine a lawyer's to be than one might an engineer's. 'You will of course understand my keen desire for discretion in this matter.'

Madame Vastra spread her hands as if to say that was understood. 'You say this man disappeared?'

'Indeed. A most reliable man. Never known to be late or absent before. I was worried. I hardly thought, however...'

'Shall we walk down to the place where it occurred?' Vastra suggested. 'As we walk, perhaps you could tell me exactly what happened, as you became aware of the events?'

'Quite. Quite.' He cleared his throat. 'May I?'

Jenny walked alongside them with lowered eyes, listening attentively and resisting the urge to come to any conclusion so early in the case.

'It was about nine o'clock in the evening, then, on the fifteenth of this month, that I was notified that Wilkins was not to be found at his regular night-watchman's post.'

'One moment, Mr Murray. Who was it notified you?'

He looked troubled. 'Brazier – one of the porters, who passes by Wilkins' station on the way home – that is, on his way home. You don't think...?'

'Mr Murray, I think nothing at this juncture. I only ask. Pray continue.'

Jenny hid her smile.

'By all means. Brazier, then, came to me to report that Wilkins was absent. After finding a man to take over his duties, I took three or four with me to make a thorough search. We found nothing.'

'There was no further trouble that night?'

'No. Since then, however, I have insisted that the watchmen work in pairs, for safety's sake.' he stopped. 'Here. This is Wilkins' post.'

A large pile of gravel, next a stack of wooden sleepers, spoke of the forthcoming track conversion. Vastra, hitching her skirts out of the way, examined the scene closely, but seemed to find nothing of particular interest. 'You say he _reappeared_. Can you show me where?'

'By all means. We must continue down to the beach.'

'He was already dead when found?'

Mr Murray shuddered. 'Regrettably. You know, Madame Vastra, if it didn't sound so absurd I would almost say that he had been attacked by some wild beast. They have stories up on the moors, of course, but we are less romantically minded down here.'

'Hm,' Vastra said. 'I suppose there was an inquest?'

'Yes – I was there, and they let me have a copy of the doctor's report. Highly irregular, I have no doubt, but I happen to know the coroner.'

'You will let me see the report?'

'Certainly. I have it here.'

Vastra took it without looking.

'Here,' said Mr Murray, 'is where poor Wilkins' body was washed up. If it _was_ washed up. It's above the high tide mark. My own feeling is that whoever did this dumped him here after the fact, hoping to make it look like an accident.'

'The scene has not been disturbed?'

'No,' said Mr Murray. 'As you see, the culprit has gone to some trouble to obscure his footmarks.'

'Ah! indeed,' said Madame Vastra. 'Indeed.' But she examined the blurred traces in the sand with considerable care, all the same.

  
They dined in their suite: a quiet meal, since Vastra had gathered much to think about. And Jenny, perhaps feeling the much-vaunted effects of sea air, was tired, and content merely to eat a meal that she had not served and look forward to a night's sleep in a bed that she had not made.

'Well,' Vastra said at last, 'that has been most instructive. I believe I know what our next move should be.'

'What's that, madam?'

'We will go to Exeter and visit the offices of the _Western Times_.'

'In which case,' Jenny said, 'our next step must surely be to go to bed.'

Vastra laughed and admitted the validity of the point. 'Come, then,' she said.

Jenny undressed swiftly: first Madame, then herself. There was no question of going to her own bed; Madame would not have had her leave the room.

'Stay here, Jenny. Do you remember when you first ran into me?'

'Quite literally ran, as I remember,' Jenny said ruefully as she stretched out in the bed.

'You were afraid,' Vastra said. 'I could smell it on you. You were afraid, but you were running towards me. I do not think that had ever happened before in my life. My brothers and sisters of the Silurian age did not fear each other, or run from each other – why should we? When I awoke in your time, people only ran from me.'

'You _had_ been eating people, madam,' Jenny pointed out. 'I didn't know that at the time.'

'It hasn't bothered you since.'

'I reckon you're doing a public service, madam. Knowing what I know now, I'd run to you again.'

Vastra laughed softly and pulled Jenny closer to her. Jenny drew and held a breath. Cool scales against hot skin; tired kisses; the delicious whisper of Madame's clever tongue.

'Gives you quite an appetite, the sea air, doesn't it, madam?' she said after a while, hoarsely.

'Impertinence...'

But she was amused, and anyway, Jenny was more than happy to make redress for that.

  
It seemed a pity to leave the sea, to turn inland to Exeter and spend a bright spring day in the archives of the _Western Times_.

The proprietor, however, was extremely helpful. They usually were, faced with Madame Vastra when she was in a mood to be efficient. 'Mr Law.'

He squinted at her card. 'Madame... Vastra. Delighted to be of assistance.'

'Miss Flint, my secretary.'

He bowed. 'Do let me know if I can help you.'

'Thank you,' Vastra said. 'We shall.' It was an unarguable dismissal.

'So, madam,' Jenny said when the door had shut behind Mr Law, 'what are you looking for?'

'Any unexpected death at Dawlish. And disappearances.' Vastra thought for a moment, and then said, 'And the tide tables.'

Four hours of solid work, and they had an imposing list. Even after Vastra had discarded the three elderly gentlemen found dead in their baths over the course of a decade, a shooting accident witnessed by five of the unfortunate victim's peers, and the unquestionable poisoning case, it seemed that Dawlish was more than usually visited by the grim spectre of death.

On the train back to Dawlish, Vastra looked over her notes.

'A carter, presumed drunk and washed out to sea, January 1886. Two young men from London, ditto, June 1890. A girl of five years gone from the beach, August 1872. A shark, the year after. Honeymoon couple, disappeared completely, June 1876. A labourer working on the new golf course at Dawlish Warren, last month. That's only the most obvious ones...' She fell silent, running her eyes down the page. 'Always at high tide, but not at every high tide. Never at a neap tide, but not reliably at a spring tide. No particular time of the day or night, no connection with light or darkness; nothing in the very early hours of the morning, but one might expect that, for so few people would be about. Not one life lost in the Royal Charter Storm, when one might expect utter chaos. Why, Jenny, why?'

'I don't know, madam.'

Vastra frowned. 'No. Nor do I. Never mind. Tomorrow I shall go bathing. We are at the seaside, after all.'

  
Tom Dale, who kept the bathing machines at Dawlish, looked old enough to have seen everything. All the same, Jenny thought it prudent to keep him talking all the while that the horses dragged Madame's down to the water line.

'Did you always keep bathing machines, Mr Dale?' she asked.

'I? bless your heart, no, my dear. I was a railwayman, back in Brunel's day.'

Surely this was a coincidence; none the less, Jenny was intrigued. 'A railwayman?'

He lit his pipe. 'I worked on the old atmospheric railway, back in the forties. You'll have seen the pumping house tower at Starcross when you came through. There was one like it here, but they pulled it down thirty years ago now, it'd be.'

'How did it work?' Jenny asked.

'It was worked by a long tube, all along the length of the track. Rather than have an engine attached to the train, the power came from the engine house; it went through the tube and sucked or blew the train along like that. They couldn't keep it going; it was a pity, but some things just can't be helped.'

'What sort of things, Mr Dale?'

He sucked at his pipe. 'Ah! that's what I wish I knew. They hushed it up. All we know for sure is that the valves failed, and the tubes lost pressure, and the trains stopped. I've heard stories: some say the salt water's no good for the leather in the valves; some say rats ate it. But I never saw rats with teeth that big, that's all I'm saying.'

'Teeth?'

'Teeth.' He nodded sagely. 'It was more like something a fish did, if you ask me. But it's a long way out of the water. It would have to have been an interesting sort of fish.'

'You didn't see it yourself, then?'

'Ah, no. I've seen some things, though, that you wouldn't credit...' He began a long story about mermaids, which Jenny found interesting, but which seemed to have little relevance to the case in hand. It was best to let him talk, she thought; she did not want him to notice how long Madame had been underwater. It would be a disaster if he panicked and raised the alarm.

So she nodded and smiled and allowed herself to enjoy the story, and in the end it was Tom Dale who said, 'Ah, your good lady's back.' He turned his back with ostentatious decorum.

  
In the bathing machine, Jenny fastened the buttons and laces, and asked in a low voice what Madame had found down there.

'Nothing to speak of – I think.' Vastra shivered. 'I shall be glad to be out in the sun again.'

'Well, then what did you expect to find, madam?'

'There are very old creatures in the seas, Jenny. Some as old as I am. I went in the hope that I might meet something I could speak to.

'All the same,' she mused, 'it was instructive. It's a different world down there, all shimmering green, and strange booming and humming sounds. I believe that, had I been able to stay there longer, I might have found something that would have helped us. I feel sure that there's a pattern to this.'

  
Jenny recounted Tom Dale's story as they returned to their rooms. Vastra was much interested.

'But,' she said, 'it might all have been foreseen. You have seen how close the sea comes to the railway here. Imagine the winter storms: a wave might come right over, and sweep away train and tracks together. You humans, so proud of your works, so unwilling to see how little stands between you and chaos!'

'You sound like a street preacher, madam,' Jenny said.

Vastra laughed. 'The atmospheric railway was obsolete before you were born. You see the end of the broad-gauge and for you and for the railwaymen it is as if a civilisation is passing away. O, Jenny, Jenny, everything changes! Have you not thought that the coal that you burn in your steam locomotives and your patent stoves and your factory engines is the bones of my sisters and brothers?'

'And yet you are still here,' Jenny said.

'Only by pure chance. Your generation should take no comfort from my continued existence. The fact that one Silurian survives a few millennia is no guarantee that any humans will.' She sighed. 'Ah, well! Let the great world spin forever down the ringing grooves of change! Wait - Jenny, that's it!'

'Is that so, madam?' Jenny asked patiently.

'Bring me a railway timetable, if you please; and a pen and ink.' She spread out on the table the fruits of their studies in Exeter the previous day. Silence reigned for some minutes; Jenny, meanwhile, occupied herself with making the tea.

'Yes! Jenny, see!'

Jenny looked. 'How very interesting,' she said.

'Isn't it?' She became grave. 'But if we're right, we have very little time. About an hour, in fact. I shall send a note to Mr Murray, asking him to meet us – in an hour and a half. You had better gather your equipment.'

  
Jenny selected her weapons with some thought. She had a pistol, if the worst came to the worst, but what she intended to use was a small but accurate crossbow, together with a dart tipped with a drug that would induce swift but harmless unconsciousness, even – she hoped – in a creature as large as the one they were facing. After that – well, she supposed Madame had an idea.

Twilight was falling. They walked without speaking down to the sea, crossed under the railway line. Jenny felt the sand under her feet, and did not altogether like it. It sank beneath her weight. She would gladly have changed it for the reliable cobbles of London. Madame seemed unperturbed.

The tide was high, leaving a few bare yards of beach between the foam and the sea wall. The gentle approach and retreat of the waves was mesmerising. _Every time_ , Jenny thought, _it comes a little further up, until..._

Above them, a train pulled into the station, the rails humming, the mighty breath of the engine slowing to a dignified wheeze.

She looked at Madame.

'Not long, now.'

'No.' Jenny turned her gaze back to the sea.

If they were right, it must come, soon. It must come.

It came, dragging itself painfully from the water, as if moving on land were an effort, summoned against its will and determined to make the journey worth its while. Now five feet tall, now fifteen, it arched its back in its clumsy progress. What was this? It seemed half whale, half octopus, spouting water from a great hole in its back, trailing rubbery tentacles behind it, dragging itself along on flippers that were surely never meant for land.

She squinted, sighting. She had to get this right.

At the edge of her vision, a movement. A cry. 'My dear Madame...!'

Distracted at the fatal moment, Jenny released the crossbow. She knew as soon as her finger touched the trigger that her aim was off.

Madame's irritated tones. 'Mr Murray. You're early.'

Jenny reloaded the crossbow, her fingers trembling. Perhaps if she were to come closer...

'Madame Vastra. Good God. What heaven's name is it?' He made a sudden unmistakeable movement.

The shot sounded before Vastra could speak.

' _No!_ \- you stupid, stupid man...'

The monster reared up and fell, flailing. The world went suddenly dark for Jenny; she was trapped beneath one massive, wounded, flipper. The air stank of salt and blood. She could feel its huge pulse beating through the skin-and-muscle canopy above her. Winded, she lay perfectly still and thought furiously. She could breathe. It was not hurting her. Was it even aware of her presence? If not, she was safest where she was, until such time as it retreated further into the water and dragged her back with it.

But it might attack Madame and Mr Murray.

She heard Madame's voice, angry and frightened. 'No – no, it's only wounded. Don't anger it further, Mr Murray, I pray you.'

Jenny could not hear Mr Murray's response. She risked shouting. 'I'm not hurt, madam!'

'Well,' and Madame sounded sharper than ever, though perhaps it was only because she had raised her voice to be sure that Jenny would hear her, 'there's that to be thankful for.'

'Can you lift his flipper?' Jenny called.

'Perhaps between the two of us...' The soft crunching of sand and stones. The thing moved.

'Mind his teeth, madam, for God's sake! No – wait! Stand back, both of you!' Infinitely carefully, she wriggled until she could move her hand. She found the little case of darts. No need to use the crossbow, as close as this. She found one of the great pulsating veins and jabbed the dart hard into one. The thing recoiled, then, after a few breathless seconds, lay still.

'Now,' Vastra said, 'we're coming to get you out.'

  
'What do we do with the monster?' Jenny asked. 'Call me soft, madam, but I don't want to shoot him. It's not as if it's his fault.'

Mr Murray made as if to protest, but Vastra quelled that with a glance. 'How long until your preparation wears off?'

'Not more than ten minutes, I wouldn't think, on something that big. It's meant for tigers and things of that size. It wouldn't touch an elephant.'

'Then we watch – from a safe distance. If we are fortunate, it will regain consciousness, return to the water, and swim away. If not – well, Jenny, you know what to do. Mr Murray, I would be obliged if you would accept my assistant's judgement in this matter. Do I presume to advise you on matters of railway engineering?'

'But my dear lady, what if it comes back? Surely we ought to secure the safety of all – besides, science would be most interested...'

Vastra glared at him again. They retreated to the safety of the railway station and watched in silence for some minutes as the tide crept ever closer to the stricken monster. Just as Jenny thought it must be overwhelmed and washed away, a flicker of movement shimmered down the length of its shortest tentacles; then the longer ones. Then it flapped its flippers, seeming pleased with the resulting splash. Which way would it go now? Up into the town, to finish the job it came to do? Or back into the water?

Jenny did not realise that she was holding her breath, until the thing slid gently back into the sea. She was desperately tired, and soaked with sea water. 'Well,' she said, 'that's that.' 

  
'How on earth does it get up past the beach?' Mr Murray wondered as they walked back through the town.

'Sheer determination, I suppose,' Vastra said. 'At the very least, Mr Murray, you know what you're dealing with now. Perhaps you could contrive some way to stop the trains annoying it.'

'I beg your pardon?'

Vastra uttered a sharp exclamation.

'I do apologise. Wait one moment, I beg you.' She thrust Jenny into Mr Murray's arms, rushed across the road, and hammered at the door of a shop. Jenny peered exhaustedly at the board: _G. S. Harvey – Pianofortes Bought – Sold – Tuned_.

G. S. Harvey himself appeared, rather alarmed in his shirtsleeves, and opened the door. Vastra spoke swiftly to him, and went in.

'What can Madame Vastra be doing?' Mr Murray asked.

'I don't know what she's doing,' Jenny said. 'Would you mind – that bench – I'm just going to...'

'I do beg your pardon,' he said.

He wanted to apologise for more than that, Jenny thought, but he couldn't work out how.

They waited in silence until Vastra returned. Jenny could not see her face through her veil, but there was a swing to her step that spoke of satisfaction.

'I believe, Mr Murray, that you needn't worry any more. Assuming that our understanding of the science of sound is adequate, you will have no further trouble. Jenny, my dear, are you quite well?'

'Of course, madam,' Jenny said. 'That's very good news.' She hoped that Mr Murray would not be tiresome and insist on taking Madame to dinner, or anything of that sort. She wanted a bath, and then to go straight to bed.

'Do explain, Madame Vastra?'

'Your monster, Mr Murray, has been coming up from the sea only on certain, very specific occasions; that is, when the tide comes higher than about nine and a half feet, while at the same time a train passes over the rails above. Conclusion: the vibrations caused resonate across and into the water, forming a sound that, for some reason I don't quite understand, summons the monster.

'One can hear it very faintly on land, of course; underwater the sound is quite striking. I spent some time swimming out in the sea, and heard several times a great booming sound. I didn't realise what it was until I looked at the train timetable. I believe that this has been happening for the last fifty years, but it's only since there was a victim connected with the railway that the two have been considered in conjunction.'

'Only since you turned your astonishing mind to the case, Madame,' said Mr Murray. 'But why do you say our troubles are over? Do you think the monster has been scared off?'

'I think that it will not return. This weekend, Mr Murray, I need hardly remind you, the rails along this line will be changed from their current seven foot gauge to the narrower, four foot eight and a half gauge. The resonance will be completely different. The note will change; the frequency will be higher. The monster may not even be able to hear it; at the very least, I believe that it will no longer come at its call. Dawlish is safe, Mr Murray.'

  
Much later, clean and warm and dry, Jenny lay in bed and enjoyed being alive. Madame, propped up on her elbow, watched her, smiling.

'It's good to be safe with you, madam. I thought for a minute I'd be setting up house with a sea monster.'

Vastra laughed, running an inquisitive finger up the length of Jenny's leg. 'You realise, my love, that the creature had more in common with you, physiologically speaking, than I do?'

'Is that so?' Jenny asked. She did not much care.

'It is. It is a mammal, as are you. I am a reptile.'

'Not sure that matters, madam.' The important thing, Jenny thought, though she was too tired to put it into words, was that she could talk to Madame, and she sure as eggs couldn't have talked to the sea monster.

'Really? There are very few people in this age who know that I am a reptile. Those who do are those whom I can trust not to run away the moment I lift my veil.'

Jenny laughed. 'I've never been scared of you.'

'I know.'

'I've never been scared since, either.' They both knew it was a lie, but there was something very true behind it.

'You weren't scared tonight?' Very soft.

Jenny stretched luxuriously; she was, after all, not as tired as all that. 'Oh, no, madam. I could never be scared of monsters any more. Not when you're with me.'

**Author's Note:**

> 'Thunders of the upper deep' is from 'The Kraken'; 'let the great world spin forever down the ringing grooves of change' is from 'Locksley Hall', both by Alfred, Lord Tennyson.
> 
> The science is barely plausible handwavium, but the history is reasonably accurate.


End file.
